Two teams chose very different weapons when they faced each other in a battle of words. Pentecostal School chose to bombard the enemy with facts and figures, while Fukien Secondary School chose the more subtle, but deadly accurate, metaphor.
And, in this case, victory went to the metaphor.
It was the first round of the 13th Nesta-SCMP Debating Competition, with Pentecostal supporting the motion 'Hong Kong teenagers are too attached to electronic gadgets' and Fukien arguing against it.
The debate took place on Monday at Fukien Secondary School in Kwun Tong. Edmond Li, an English teacher from Ning Po College, was the adjudicator.
Li declared Fukien the winners because he thought they had done a better job with their argument, using metaphors to build up their case. He added that Pentecostal lost points for blitzing the audience with too much information. 'One thing that debaters have to bear in mind is that numbers and statistics are used to support the arguments; they cannot be presented as arguments,' Li said.
'The affirmative side had done a great job of researching but they need to make better use of the numbers and facts to support their argument. Overwhelming the audience with statistics is certainly not a good approach.'
